Covering the WestSide as it is today and Challenging everyone to become involve as we move into the future.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Time to Take The Right Path In Responding To Critics

It is real easy to write about what is wrong. It is real easy to complain about what is wrong. It is real easy to overlook the positive and focus on the negative. I was starting to write this column and do just that. Focus on the negative because when so much of the world is raining down on you, it is hard to see dry land when all around you is a down pouring of rain.

We as a country are at our own fork in the road. Make the right turn and we can come out okay. The right road may be bumpy and it may look like a mountain is sitting in the middle of the path that we’ll have to take blocking our way, but it is the right way to go. The left turn looks good, smooth as ice but as we all know that left turn will take us off of a steep cliff.

This past week, another issue was placed before us where we had to decide which direction to take. A most disturbing cartoon was run in the New York Post Newspaper. It came on the heels of the news story of the woman whose chimp ran amok and was shot after tearing off the face of one of the woman’s friends. If you didn’t see the cartoon, it can be found all over the internet. To describe the cartoon, it involved two cops with their guns smoking and the chimp lying dead on the ground with two bullet holes in the chest. One police officer says to the other, “They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill".

Since President Barack Obama is considered the author of the idea for the stimulus package that just passed, many interpreted that the dead monkey on the ground was a metaphor for him. There was outrage, indignation and calls for the firing of the man who drew the cartoon as well as a boycott against the New York Post for printing it and the advertisers who bought ads in the paper. Originally the Post had declared it had the right to print what it printed. The Post defended the cartoonist and called the Rev. Al Sharpton who was one of the leading figures in the fight against the cartoon a media hound. Rev. Sharpton’s actions were so successful that a week later the owner of the paper issued an apology. So in the mist of bad news, we had the Rev. Sharpton and others doing the right things and their protest resulted in the right action.

Most interesting is that the media tried to paint the outrage over the cartoon as if only black people were upset. The last I looked, President Obama was elected by all of America and all of America should be upset. To many black Americans, we saw the lines connecting the dots immediately. To all of America, in a society where the numbers of guns purchased since the election of Barack Obama has gone thru the roof, to see a cartoon depicting dead the author of the stimulus bill is insulting. To have the author being a chimp had a double entendre meaning.

But another thought came to my mind once this controversy hit the fan. How will those of us who have put President Obama on a pedestal take it when he is attacked in effigy? When foreign nationals burn the U.S. flag and posters of the president, how will we take it when it’s President Obama’s face being used? How will we take it, the black America that says just the sight of a noose has traumatized some African Americans when others mad at the policies of this country hang the president from a noose? Or place his picture on an ape’s body?

President Obama so far has always taken the right turn. And those that have attacked him are finding out that people can see the right in what he is doing and are not easily swayed in the wrong direction. So far, President Obama has only been in office for thirty days and has taken all that has been thrust upon him with the greatest of ease. It will be an interesting and telling time as we begin the second thirty days of the presidency of Barack Obama.

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Arlene Jones

EMAIL ME: WESTSIDE2DAY@YAHOO.COM

Arlene Jones' Biography

I was born in Chicago. I grew up in Cabrini Green. I attended Wells Sr High, the University of Illinois at Chicago Circle where I majored in Spanish and minored in Education. I have a diploma in Computer Programming.

I moved to Austin when I purchased a home here. I have two children.

I have been active in the community since moving here. I started with my blockclub. In the early 1990s, I worked with several people to try and form the North Austin Homeowners Association. I even went on patrol with a group of people who had a walkie talkie car patrol of the neighborhood.

As with most programs in the AA community, many factors led to the demise of those groups. Lack of support from elected officials was at the top of the list.

There were several people who had a group and we met out of DaVinci Manor. DaVinci Manor was at the corner of North Ave and Central where Walgreen now stands. Again there was very little interest in saving that building and our community lost a beautiful hall.

I have protested the state of the Central Ave bridge. I worked with Leola Spann and did many a smoke out including one in the 1500 block of North Lorel where drug paraphenalia layed on the ground. I have over the years here in Austin worked with the following groups at one point or another:
Northeast Austin Organization (Mary Volpe, Tom Hosea);
Northwest Austin Council;
Mad Dads;
Brotherhood of Black Men;
Westside Health Authority;
Nobel Neighbors;
Every Block A Village;
Beat 2532;
25th District Housing Committee;
WVON Volunteer;
African American Employees at the Merchandise Mart (AAEMM);
Lafollette Park Advisory Council;
Garfield Park Conservatory Advisory Council;
Westside Executive Advisory Council;
Austin Landmark Cultural Center;
Concerned Citizens of East Garfield Park

and so many others that it gets hard to remember.

Arlene Jones

QUOTE OF THE DAY

If you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing. -- Malcolm X